The lighting system of a motor vehicle consists of lighting and signaling devices mounted or integrated to the front, sides, rear, and in some cases the top of the motor vehicle. The purpose of this system is to provide illumination for the driver to operate the vehicle safely after dark, to increase the conspicuity of the vehicle, and to display information about the vehicle's presence, position, size, direction of travel, and driver's intentions regarding direction and speed of travel. Many types of lamps are used for turn signal, brake lamps, side and clearance marker lamps, and interior lamps.
Red steady-burning rear lights, brighter than the rear position lamps, are activated when the driver applies the vehicle's brakes. These are called “stop lamps” or “brake lights.” Brake lights may also include a central brake lamp, mounted higher than the vehicle's left and right brake lamps, also called a center brake light. The center brake light is intended to provide a deceleration warning to following drivers whose view of the vehicle's left and right stop lamps is blocked by interceding vehicles. It also helps to disambiguate brake vs. turn signal lights, where red rear turn signals identical in appearance to stop lamps are permitted, and also can provide a redundant stop light signal in the event of a stop lamp malfunction. The center brake light is generally required to illuminate steadily and not permitted to flash.
One of the shortcomings of conventional braking indicator safety systems is that although the systems illuminate a vehicle's brake lights, they fail to indicate to other vehicles with great precision the level of intensity the deceleration of the vehicle will occur. Another shortcoming of conventional braking indicator systems is that they are activated solely based on the braking induced by the driver of the vehicle. Yet another shortcoming of conventional braking indicator systems is that they do not alert other vehicles with the precise braking patterns of the driver of a forward vehicle in terms of whether the driver is tapping on the brake pedal, slamming on the brake pedal or is simply engaged in a gradual depressing of the brake pedal.
Therefore, a need exists to overcome the problems with the prior art as discussed above, and particularly for a more efficient way of providing more accuracy in a braking indicator safety system.